I. Field
The present invention relates generally to communication, and more specifically to pilot transmission and channel estimation in a wireless communication system.
II. Background
In a wireless communication system, it is often necessary to estimate the response of a wireless channel from a transmitter to a receiver. The channel estimate may be used for various purposes such as data detection, time synchronization, frequency correction, spatial processing, rate selection, and so on. Channel estimation is typically performed by transmitting a pilot signal containing pilot symbols that are known a priori by both the transmitter and receiver. The receiver can then estimate the channel gains as a ratio of the received pilot symbols over the known pilot symbols.
The pilot signal is typically impaired by both noise and interference. These impairments degrade the quality of the channel estimate obtained by the receiver based on the received pilot signal. The noise can come from various sources such as the wireless channel, receiver electronics, and so on. Noise impairment can normally be addressed by transmitting the pilot signal in a proper manner and/or for a sufficient period of time such that the receiver can obtain the desired quality for the channel estimate. The interference can result from multiple transmitters transmitting their pilot signals simultaneously. These transmitters may be for different base stations in the system, different antennas of the same base station, and so on. In any case, the pilot signal from each transmitter acts as interference to the pilot signals from other transmitters. This pilot interference degrades the quality of the channel estimate.
There is therefore a need in the art for techniques to obtain a high quality channel estimate in the presence of multiple transmitters.